Espres - so yourself

Chapters two and three dropped down yesterday as I rested before going to class. I didn't sleep much Wednesday night and was feeling really off center (it went into the night and a few attendance abusing students almost got my total wrath but I turned and instead lectured them to death) so I laid down for a few minutes, closed my eyes and in silence here came the two chapters, one already written and what I previously anticipated as the beginning, is now the second chunk. The third, a new revelation and one I need to write today or Sunday during my peace and silence without any sight of school.

I'm not going to talk about the content for I believe in my gut the method Stephen King uses while writing and that is not to mention the book at all until the first draft is finished and after his ideal reader (his wife) has read it, commented and the second draft from Stephen's eyes finished and sent to his editor and publisher.

Off to a full day of classes in frigid, frigid temperatures. It's pay day. I think I'll be forfeiting a few greenbacks to cash it (our school does not have direct deposit!) next door at the ratty Check Cashing place rather than running around outside for too long. I'm going to hole up in my school for 12 hours. I'm giving the first round of finals so I can sit there and grade another class as the one in front of me writes. Just the way I like it. Getting paid to grade.

I'm going to drink a little espresso and jolt myself awake and get on with this day, ideas already breaking into my World.

Whatever is in you and what you want to do in life, do it now.

Satay and Storyline

A chapter came out and fell down onto the page like a ripe piece of fruit, a peach if you will. I just wasn't feeling the computer and so with my new notebook, I gingerly sat onto the futon demanding that my eyes not roam over to the remote and forget my purpose!

I took the notebook and just let myself relax and then miracle of miracles! out came a sentence "and it was good" and then another, and another and six pages later, I realized: I have finished material that IS a chapter. All the loose ends began to tie up into this chapter and I was on my way!

The storyline is making itself pretty clear to me, however the fun, I am realizing is not knowing it verbatim. This chapter showed me I was well on my way with the characters and while still in the dark understand! I understand the main idea, as I drone on constantly preaching to my students.

The main idea, the structure, the skeleton of this work is planted. And all the other thoughts and 37 pages of notes will fit in, like a puzzle. Everytime I have a recurring dream of tending a baby through tumbles and near spills, and crazy color scenarios, I know the baby is my story and I will not let go! Most recently I saw the face! a dear, sweet face with red, red lips.

Leila called and invited me to eat at one of our favorite places: Faan, an Asian Fusion restaurant that blows your top off. I went and the whole evening felt celebratory. Another day of jubilation! Yesterday, since it is Restaurant Week in NY, she treated me to Japanese food at Nobu in Tribeca! Then we went to Donut Plant on the Lower East Side before I went on to teach at school.

Okay, all these things, it just has been divine and I am grateful. Thankful and grateful. Thank you.

Greasy Victory

Hoorah! It is Sunday! and I am here, getting ready to make coffee, do a bit of housework, and more of writing! I am trying to get to my buddy's gig in Manhattan tonight. If I go, it's alone, and that's okay. Meeting up with Anna and perhaps a friend of hers. Focus, Sheela, and get there. It's not easy being a recluse; that feeling of wanting to curl up and not move. The sky is a fluffy, heavy white coming down on me like a thick comforter telling me it's all okay, rest, go in, go in, and be well. I have blessed Monday - all day - to write, too, so I need to do it all. Just do it.

Yesterday I made a double cheeseburger and nearly killed myself, but man was it good! May have to do it again, but then I do have to get out or they'll find me on the futon with mayo on my lip and a smile! I am ready for another payday; I want to buy some celery and salad. This life, this life in being a dreamer and a workhorse longing for another meadow leaves one panting and always counting the change underneath the cushions. I'm amazed I've gotten this far. Watch me. I've still some to go.

My daughters are my greatest claim to fame. They have risen up and snatching their stars, hooking their proverbial wagon to decent stars. I wake in the morning and think of them. This being an empty nester is sad in that you think of all the stupid things you did wrong and now that you can think! all the things you'd do right. But I think of them and they are blindingly whole and functioning with incredible energies. I will continue to give all the coal I can provide for their engines of life. They are my stars, the rest of my dreams dim in their comparison.

And then, then the dormant stuff inside me it is rising, it is forming, it is coming together. This is my time. I have not loved the one I'm with and now Sheela y Sheela are arm in arm and I will not let her down anymore. It is no one's fault, not even mine. It is life. It is this moment that tells me this. No worries. Once again, just do it.

The novel burst another seam last night and I realized more of the pattern of what I am trying to do. To Bryan who suggested I fictionalize my angst, my catharsis, I tip my hat. It has made all the difference. And to Eileen, too. "Stop thanking us," I can hear them say. "Do it."

"See if you can do it," I suspect Bryan would say. And for the first time in my dysfunctional writing life, I see that I can, and even if it is riddled with problems, they are my problems. I see the horizon. I'm back in the innertube on Lake Huron, staring at the horizon.

And it is good.

Come Sunday

Today's weather is frigid and I am looking at leaving for school in the next 15 minutes. Problem is my stomach is acting up. I can't figure it out. Maybe it's from yesterday's full day of classes. The students were finishing up their last essays and the day turned into a scattered array of motion from me allowing them to go to the computer and writing areas to print the last draft to many of us chatting inbetween edits and writing. My students live in dangerous neighborhoods; not because of them but because of a stilted and racist society. Their stories made me ill as well as equally lifting me up to see their resilience. Then I found a memo scolding me unnamed for letting so many traipse into the Writing Center without me. It all made me feel useless and discouraged. I came home last night worn. I tried to write it all out. I did and it gave me a moment to realize I am growing stronger and stronger as a writer. I went to bed and had vivid dreams, all meaning something, but I'm too weary to note it.

Today I must be strong and get dressed and go out. I need the money. There is nothing I would rather do than lie down and sleep. But, like them, I will get up and go out. My stomach, I pray will calm down. It is cold outside. Neighborhoods are unsafe. Conditions neglected. People disrespected. The last thing I heard last night was an Army official on Charlie Rose who said halfway is failure, or something like that.

I look forward to six o'clock when I can clock out and go home knowing my work has been done.

When Kristi Laughs

I'm talking to my wonderful friend, Kristi! Thanks to a mutual friend, I have refound Kristi, my friend from the 70s and into the 80s and beyond! Kristi and I were roommates after becoming great pals at the State National Bank where we were the finest, fastest, and smartest tellers in the bunch (well, Kristi was, but I was able to glean my customer service skills there that would take me on to public relations just fine).

Now let me tell you about Kristi.

This is a woman who I cannot garner one, not one time when she treated me unkindly. A true friend like her I have never known and my older girl, Leila, reminds me so much of her that I swear our friendship and partying years served as an osmosis to produce a mini Kristi.

Kristi took hours to put on her makeup that transformed an already pretty girl into a nighttime celeb. The girls of Hollywood and Daddy's money had nothing on Kristi. We rode in her Toyota (she was a major tailgater, are you still, Kristi?) and ne'er got a scratch or in an accident. We drank White Russians, and shooters with like eight liquors in it. I can still see and taste it. The night took off with those!

Kristi had an infectious laugh and when she blew out cigarette smoke from one of my jokes or comments, I was the hit of the club. Oh the men Kristi attracted. I just stood around begging for crumbs and trying to make her laugh.

Those were the days. Whenever I hear "Hotel California" I think of Kristi. Driving into work after sleeping two hours, in the same clothes, not caring if we smelled of dead smoke and beer, Kristi and I ruled the World back then before babies and utter, utter heartbreak.

Having her friendship back via Email is like coming home. Makes me want a White Russian and the sound of her laughter.

Running

Wrote for four hours yesterday until 1 pm! It was heaven. Tonight I have classes, so I'm going to fine tune my lesson and such...not in the same vibe on class day. Not feeling it. I already look forward to tomorrow, Wednesday. It's getting colder here in the Northeast, hoorah! Never thought I'd be looking forward to a real winter, but bring it on. For the atmosphere and ecosphere, hit me with your best shot!

I walked to The Promenade and then jogged it from one end to the other. It's not terribly long, but it was a nice beginning. I plan - if it's not raining - to go tomorrow and run it up and back, twice! I feel so much better this morning. It is my goal to be slamming by the time Sarah rolls around again for Spring Break. I just want to feel on top of my game and these extra pounds that I've been packing for the past two decades, it is time for them to go, once and for all.

I was surprised how smoothly I ran; my muscles are more in shape than I thought. I have some good endurance, just need to improve on the cardio. The stairs wind me and I'm tired of that. It would be so great - for once - to keep up with my daughters on our hike upstairs.

The holidays with them were memorable. Even the rough times. That's why it's such precious times, these times, all times. The happiness I felt yesterday, I will get it everyday, and receive money i.e., energy from it. I know this now. I called my younger brother yesterday, though, and he asked if my method was to wait until I was on "skid row"? It shocked me; his anger, but he is going through a lot of struggles right now and I forgive him. I'm fresh from watching "The Pursuit of Happyness". I can make it through anything and understand now how important it is to "protect my dream."

IMPEACH

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,–That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security." - The Declaration of Independence

In 1966, King said "I'm still convinced there's nothing more powerful to dramatize a social evil than the tramp tramp of marching people."

I woke up this morning after a horrible dream that I was out of town and my brother let a real jerk stay at my place and bring two dogs in with my cats. It was a very troubled dream and I awoke shaken only to find one of my two cats pestering me to wake up. Now who's the bother and pain!? So I got up and fed them, did my morning pages, made coffee, and after this post am going to write until noon. I am off this entire day, as I have been every Monday for this semester. It is heavenly. Sarah left for school yesterday and Leila is at work, and after the Holidays I am thankful for the time I had with my daughters, and also understand the value of this time alone, too. So I plan to stick to my schedule and not become distracted as I have in the past. I am a late bloomer, but when I get it, I get it.

I have taped to my computer a quote I've packed around for years found on the bottom of a writer's diary, given to me by a sweet co-worker who got me. The quote is by Raymond Carver, who I had the divine luck of sitting in one of his classes back in the late, late 70s, round the time he met Tess Gallagher who would be his live in lover and later wife, when he married her on his deathbed. I felt his energy, his "in the zone" back then and knew if he could do it (recovering alcoholic), I could, too. I did not know until nearly ten years later when at his memorial at the University of Texas at El Paso, this was how I felt, but I know it now. His quote is this: "Writing's not terrible, it's wonderful. I keep my own hours, do what I please. When I want to travel, I can. But mainly I'm doing what I most wanted to do all my life. I'm not into the agonies of creation."

I absolutely get it. Whatever roadblocks or tragedies befall us - whether self inflicted or reactions from society - just do it; keep on with your dream. Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Day and I am charged with his passion, his understanding of doing it as it rolls across the screen of the mind's eye. Whatever that is, only YOU know, just do it.

Fuck Nike. Just do it.

Doing it My Way

I don't know what it is but I wake up nearly every morning, okay every morning and sidestep my morning pages for the computer and email. It's become a real problem. I am losing so much this way, I know it, and yet, there I go right after the bathroom, feeding the cats, straight to the computer! I need email rehab! I know it is a way to avoid what I really want to write: My sadness in being in a profession I do not love, teaching. I love the students, hate the procedures and well, I took a career choice test yesterday and teaching and social work was very, very low on the list. I had to laugh. Top on the list was food service beating out writing by a couple points! But the truth is I am tired of dealing with people, serving them, so going into food service would be more of the same. Maybe I can write about it, about good restaurants or something I have yet to see that relates.

All I know is I have to get back to morning pages or some form of process that excavates what has been looping in my head upon waking. I'm losing gems of ideas because of this addiction to see who has written to me. Email for me is like Christmas morning: What did I get?

The responses will still be there after morning pages. Julia Cameron is a brilliant woman. When will I listen to her?

What I have done already, though, is to write an article/essay on that career test. Last night I wrote an article/essay on how infuriating it is to hear the remarks made to my beautiful daughters on the streets. Verbal rape is what I call it. I'm letting the words come out and my writing is flowing better than ever before, so I'm doing something right. I just want to keep doing it. And now I know that teaching is detrimental to my core and I do not feel so guilty anymore that little bit of time I put into creating lessons and such. In the classroom, I give my all to the students. I love them and they love me. But I love this moment of solitude more and I choose it. I'll figure out the rest as I go along.

peek-a-boo!

Help on the Horizon

My brilliant nephew and computer extraordinaire, Robert Hastings Heimer, is helping me with my two sites. I just launched one to offer writing lessons specifically to bring out your "voice". Please check it out at wolfordwrite.com. I will be uploading lessons soon.

Gut Riders Wanted

The more I read Brenda Ueland’s book “If You Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence and Spirit” the more obvious it becomes to me how many writers who wish more than life itself to be published aren’t reading it. I agree with Brenda that we all have a story to tell and a unique and sharp writer’s voice in which to tell it. The problem is so many of us don’t reach way down to find it but instead ice skate along with adjectives, adverbs and long winded sentences that glide but do not delight or guide us through their tale.

I want to read someone’s writing as I eat good food (or even junk food) in big bites, easy to take in, tasty, and completely satisfying bite after bite, chewed down and swallowed, every little bit and chunk, completely eaten and digested. I don’t want to eat morsels, randomly salted with an interesting word or phrase, meant to mask the overall recipe that is just going wrong or holding great promise but weighed down with inappropriate sauces and ingredients.

I have been published very little in my nearly three decades as a writer. It is totally my fault as I simply write and discard and seldom send out. I am not fabulous in grammar and punctuation. I am lazy, unproductive, and have enough issues to write volumes of books, but I freeze up like I wish our glaciers still did.

Still, I want to be a clear and heavily eaten writer. So I’m a sideline cook who’s learning thanks to people like Brenda Ueland and Stephen King (“Memoir on Writing”) to use the tools of good writing and to write from the well of who I am. Unfortunately, it has also helped me to detect if other writers are doing the same. So many aren’t.

Good writing seems to be good from the gut. Your gut. No one else’s. And even if it sounds or tastes appealing, taste it again with the sensory buds of your voice. Is it delicious or deliciously clever and still not making a connection with you or your reader?

Be real. Do you love the way the words fit together but does it do nothing for your story or thoughts? Get rid of it and insert your true voice. Instead of showing your refined vocabulary, show us your cranky, sobbing, operatic voice.

Now sing, dammit. And I will too.

Money, Money, Money...Kills Children

Here's what I just read in CODEPINK's latest email:

"We have spent nearly $400 billion on the war in Iraq and will spend half a trillion dollars by the end of 2009 even if all U.S. troops were withdrawn next week. Deadly attacks against American troops and Iraqi security forces continue on a daily basis. The increasingly brutal occupation by American troops provides insurgents with a constant stream of new recruits. More boots on the ground is clearly not the answer, but President Bush isn't listening to anyone -- not to the Baker Study Group, not to the Generals running the show in Iraq, not to many Senators and Congress people from his own party. In the face of this willful deafness, we -- like the tiny people in Dr. Seuss's fable Horton Hears A Who -- have to shout in unison a loud and clear NO." Codepink@mail.democracyinaction.org

Sigh.

It is so very, very obvious to me how we are being robbed blind. Such a scheme. Four hundred billion taken from Americans and put into Halliburton's hands. They are laughing all the way to the bank. I have a student in my Friday Comp I class. Her son is in Iraq. She prays with every fibre in her body that he will come home alive. I am surprised she can walk around like a sane woman. I would be in a strait jacket.

CODEPINK asks for my attendance at one of their events to resist this atrocity. Or it suggests coming up with one of my own. This is my event. Please read and react. I read yesterday that even after the tragic death of Nixmary, the little girl brutally killed by her stepfather, that ACS's lack of ability to save the children in these situations in NYC is up 60 percent. Again I must agree with Sylvia Browne. This is the most negative planet in the Universe. Energy gone bad.

As Frida Kahlo said I agree and wish never to return here after I die. This is a sad World.

It Makes Sense Once You Touch on It

Woke up to a stunning sunrise. The East produces some killers. What we late sleepers miss in the early morning. Leila was up and preparing for her second day as a real live fashion stylist. Her days of assisting are paying off. She is loved where she works and I am thankful for her. She inspires me to protect my dream, too. The girl had big courage to say she wasn't feeling college and to come home. EVERYONE except me (no brag just fact) told her she was making a big mistake. Now she's doing what she loves and making a decent penny at it, too.

My friend, Anna, slipped her CUNY graduate school application into the mail yesterday. She took a picture of the package and it gave me such a warm feeling. We borrowed glue from the Post Office to seal the envelope. Nothing could be overlooked; this was her future we were dealing with and she will be accepted and change the world, I just know it. Once she is given all the tools she needs, she will report on major grievances going on in the Globe. I am thankful for Anna. She inspires me to protect my dream, too.

If you haven't seen "The Pursuit of Happyness" yet, I urge you to see it or get it on DVD. Chris Gardner went through hell to protect his dream and his little son went through the gates of Hell with him, but they were happy in the madness; in the maze of what it takes to get to the other side. We all can get to the other side; it's up to us. I realized while seeing this movie for the third time that each of us has a divine purpose, one that will charge us up everyday if we touch on it, but the reality is we are either weak or strong. The strong ones hold on, endure all the wickedness, torture, and angst that comes in the process. The weak ones see the sweet prize but they let go because they do not love it enough and do not have the will to protect it.

I want to be a strong one. I will protect it. Let me back up. Until you find your purpose you don't know what to protect. I have floundered for decades. Yes, I worked everyday; got two degrees; raised two wonderful daughters; but in my purpose I was always on the outskirts. Until I learned about my desire to write novels. Like a bolt of lightning I feel the energy that was never quite in me until about six years ago when I KNEW I wanted to work in solitude, but it wasn't until the idea of writing a novel was thrown at me and I caught it! Now everything is working together. I'm a better Mom, teacher, and most of all protector of my dream.

The sunrise tells me to get up. It says it will not be much longer before I rise to write, read, and produce on a regular basis. I am not a young woman anymore, but I know who I am and what I am supposed to do the rest of my days. I rise up like that beautiful morning sun.

Shut Up and Stand By Your Man

I am sick and tired of the cheap shots being taken - once again - at women. This time it's the celebrity gals, especially Britney Spears. I don't care if she walks around naked drunk all the time, leave her alone! She sang and danced and made shitloads of money and her kids will never go without. Leave Courtney Love alone, too! My beef here is what I see being done to women who stand up and just live! Think of all the Dads out there who fuck up all the time, and no press...or at least no mention of their kids' safety. It is a direct blow to the head of femininity, not Sean Preston as one crass columnist stated in Metro against Spears.

This is what NOW should be screaming about...it starts at the root! Britney having her vagina photographed is enough. Enough already! Let Patriarchy ring! And K-Fed is shot with his date for New Year's Eve. Oh he's got it together all right. Screw the head of one burned out pop star and then screw her in that vagina twice and laugh all the way to the moral bank!

Enough. Comon feminists get broiled over this...stop being June Cleaver fighting for abortion only. Fight for the blatant things like the way young women are whistled at and spoken to completely inappropriately until they can develop their first cellulite, wrinkle or hot flash whichever comes first! Don't you see? It's direct fire upon women. It's patriarchy coming at you and it starts way before abortion and equal pay. Today I read the story of the Debutantes who've recently come out. They are escorted by a male college student or military gent. Don't you see? Women are pulverized if they don't play by the rules. They run the risk of losing their children and their dignity. And it has nothing to do with being drunk on New Year's Eve in Vegas or showing one's peach to the World.